The Gardening Everyday

When creating a home vegetable garden plan there are several points that you should consider if you want to ensure success.  Most of these vegetable garden plan ideas are fairly straight forward though often overlooked.

The first point is row orientation.  As the sun rises from the east and sets in the west a home vegetable garden plan that takes this into consideration will benefit greatly.  Rows situated north to south will ensure plants receive the most amount of sunlight during the day.

The next point to consider when designing a home vegetable garden plan is plant height.  This ties in with the first point in maximizing sunlight in the entire garden.  Ideally, taller plants such as staked or caged tomatoes should be on the east side.  Stepping down in size as you move west will prevent shading through the most intense sunlight hours of mid morning through late afternoon. 

Here is one caveat to consider: all home vegetable garden plans should include crop rotations on at least a 3 year cycle.  Crop rotation simply refers to not planting the same crop in the same location each season.  So how do you place the tomatoes on the east side each year when pests and diseases will build up if you don’t rotate?  Our solution is to split our home vegetable garden plan into three sections on a north south line.

Let me explain this third point in more detail.  The three sections are south, center, and north.  Each year we can plant our tomatoes on the east side of our garden and rotate them through the three sections for three seasons.  The non tomato sections in our home vegetable garden plan will usually have corn or vertically grown cucumbers on their east sides.  This helps us to make sure we can rotate crop families properly.

A fourth and final point to consider for your home vegetable garden plan is water.  This may seem to be common sense.  However, if you are planning a new garden, consider locating it in close proximity to your water source.  This will allow for fewer hoses, etc. to be needed.

All of the above home vegetable garden plan topics can be easily implemented.  Also, this is by no means an exhaustive list.  These are my opinion of the most critical when planning your next home vegetable garden.

Happy Gardening!

Related posts:

1. How To Start A Vegetable Garden From Bare (or not so bare!) Ground – Garden size considerations
2. Diseases Affecting Spinach in the Home Garden
3. How To Start A Vegetable Garden From Bare (or not so bare!) Ground – Choosing a site

Tags: garden plan, home vegetable garden, vegetable garden plan